Daily Archives: March 3, 2019

I’ve been in awe over the last couple of days watching the depth of support for the idea of a lorry named after LB unfold in response to a tweet by Eddie Stobart asking for ideas for names. Some background can be found here. If you search for Connor Sparrowhawk on Twitter there are literally hundreds of tweets ‘voting’ for him. It’s truly extraordinary. Particularly the spread of tweeters; learning disabled people, self advocates, parents, siblings and other family members, medics, social workers, the police, tv producers, film makers, social care directors, academics, activists, MPs, a shadow Minister, human rights experts, senior execs from NHS Trusts, regulators and third sector organisations.

My dad used to come home from work just after 5pm every day when we were pups and always ask my mum ‘Did anything strange or startling happen today?’ before giving her a kiss. I’m not sure it ever did to be honest.

This has been strange and startling. With an equally brilliant background. LB was a huge Eddie Stobart fan. We’ve a trunk of memorabilia and bits scattered around the house still. He enjoyed nothing more than a trip on a motorway to silently and beautifully enjoy Eddie spotting in solitude. When Edward Stobart died, he wanted to express his sadness online.

LB’s auntie Sam contacted Eddie Stobart in August 2013, a month after he died, to ask for a truck to be named after him. This was the information she sent:

The company again responded sensitively:

Dear Sam,

Thanks for your email. Due to the Stobart tradition of naming trucks after females we are unable to name a vehicle after Connor however we have wracked our brains and if you felt it was appropriate we could include a tribute piece in the next edition of Spot On the members magazine. If this was interest please could you send me a photo of Connor. I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards, Bonnie

Sam sent this photo of Connor and Rosie flagging up that the sweatshirt might be a pirate version.

[I don’t know if this was an authentic Eddie sweatshirt but it features in the top photo almost unrecognisably. The unit excelled in boiling and shrinking clothes.]

Some of the tweets in support of naming a cab after Connor have referred to social justice and what such a decision would signify for a typically marginalised group of people who are too often denied an opportunity to lead anything approaching a flourishing life. Wendy Greenberg captured this:

It’s within the gift of the Eddie Stobart company to balance the justice scales a little bit and generate warmth, delight and priceless joy to have a ‘Connor Sparrowhawk’ cab beetling around the motorways of the UK and abroad. I can’t even begin to imagine making sense of what this would mean for us amidst the horror of the last six years. Connor never stopped reaching for the stars [his family tree produced by the unit psychologist included Dappy and Tulisa from his beloved NDubz on the sibling line]. The idea of a lorry named after him is the stuff of dreams. It would further be a cracking reminder for health and social care staff (and others) of the importance, value and brilliance of people like Connor.

I hope you can do this. Looking at the hundreds of replies to your request for names Connor is belting it out of the park with little or no competition.